


young blood

by eugyne (AreteNike)



Series: The Global Appellation, Licensing, and Reparation Association for Superhumans [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: (plus death), Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Canon-Typical Violence, Established Relationship, Implied Sexual Content, Keith (Voltron) Whump, Lance (Voltron) Whump, M/M, Miscommunication, Whump, or maybe just lack of communication and a steady buildup of lies, that collapse and crush anyone beneath them :), the point is no one gets out of this in one piece alright
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-30
Updated: 2017-09-30
Packaged: 2019-01-07 07:22:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12228243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AreteNike/pseuds/eugyne
Summary: There's a way out of this without penalty, the letter offers. The Association will pretend none of this ever happened, if he'll only help them with this one thing. With this one super.He goes by Torch. A dossier will be sent shortly.





	young blood

**Author's Note:**

> mind the tags yall.

The End of Life as Lance Knows It comes in the form of an envelope in his mailbox in the campus post office, plain, with no return address.

His first thought is that it's some sort of prank, or maybe some school thing—Keith gets envelopes like this when he makes Dean's List. Lance is _pretty_ sure those are marked with the school logo somewhere, but he's not _totally_ sure, so he opens it up with a nervous excitement.

He doesn't read the letter, though. The logo at the top isn't the school's. It's the official seal of the Global Appellation, Licensing, and Reparation Association for Superhumans.

He sucks in a breath and stuffs the letter back in its envelope, and that into his pocket, furtively glancing up and down the empty hall.

No one was supposed to know. He hasn't _told_ anyone, not even Keith. Yeah, he's been putting off registering—there was a time when he wanted the glory, the recognition, sure. But he has _goals,_ dammit. He thought he could fly under the radar and just go out and save people now and then, vigilante-style, maybe _liked_ but not necessarily _known._

No one was supposed to know.

But if the Association knows who he is, that's it. His life is over. His dreams are gone down the drain.

He hurries back to his dorm with his heart in his throat, back over the frozen river and up the elevator to his apartment to slump onto the hard, school-provided couch and stare blankly out the window for a good ten minutes.

Eventually he shrugs off his coat, slips out of his boots and dumps his backpack on the floor. Keith is in class right now, a small blessing—Lance can lean right up against the window, watch the cars fight the slush below alone. The sky is gray and shimmering the way it has been since late summer, and he watches tiny snowflakes drift down past their seventh-floor apartment until the glass fogs from his breath.

January. To think he'd been excited about his final semester. Now he won't even get to graduate.

He peels himself away from the window and tugs the letter out of his pocket, eventually, figuring he'd better at least get the details of his doom. He perches on the arm of the couch, too unsettled even to sit properly.

The letter starts exactly how he expects, stern and direct, the written equivalent of getting yelled at. It makes him shrink inward the same way, at least, makes him feel small. Foolish. _Stupid_ for thinking he could get away with anything.

They know his name—both names, real and super. They know what he's done. They know he's unregistered.

He contemplates, briefly, destroying the letter, pretending he never got it—but they will only come down on him all the more harshly for it.

He contemplates running, too, but the Association already has its roots down all across the world and is only spreading. Where could he hide?

He keeps reading. It's only when he gets to the end of the letter that something breaks through the despair—surprise.

There's a way out of this without penalty, it offers. They can pretend none of this ever happened, if he'll only help them with this one thing. With this one super.

He goes by Torch. A dossier will be sent shortly.

Lance remembers to breathe.

He slides down onto the couch fully, clutching the letter and staring blankly at the signature without actually seeing it. He can get off scot-free. He'll have to join the Association, sure, but he'll take that over getting locked up in one of their facilities—restrained so his powers are useless. He'll take anything over that.

All he has to do is drag some poor sap in with him. A minor villain, maybe—except he thinks he's heard of Torch, vaguely, and he's pretty sure he isn't. Just another vigilante, like him. Maybe a little more controversial. Maybe he got a letter, too, and refused the offer within.

Maybe he's braver than Lance is. Maybe he chose freedom at any cost.

Maybe he has no idea at all what's coming for him. But god help him, if it means staying out of a super facility, _Lance doesn't care._

Pathetic. He's pathetic. He crumples up the letter and tosses it across the room; it bounces off the TV and ends up back at his feet.

And then he hears the telltale sound of a key in the lock and he scrambles to stuff the letter in his backpack. He sprawls out on the couch seconds before Keith comes around the corner and sees him.

"Do you have to leave your shit everywhere?"

"Hello to you too, babe," Lance groans, throwing an arm across his face. He doesn't want to think about the Association right now, and Keith is going to be the _best_ distraction, if Lance plays this right.

"Would it kill you to hang up your coat, at least?" Keith doesn't sound annoyed, just tired and a little bewildered, which means he's in a good mood.

"I'm too cold to move," Lance whines in return, lifting his arms and beckoning with eyes closed. "Come warm me up."

He does tend to run cold—a side effect of having ice powers, he presumes. He only got them a few months ago, same as anyone, but back then it was fine; winter like this, though, is turning out to be... fun.

There's a snort, and some shuffling. A door opens—the closet?—and there's more shuffling.

"Keith?"

"I'm coming!" Keith calls back. Lance waits patiently, arms still in the air. The key to Keith has always been patience.

Sure enough, light, bootless footsteps come up to the couch, and then the cushion between his legs dips with Keith's knee and Keith's lowering himself onto Lance's chest. His arms worm under Lance's shoulders as Lance rests his own on Keith's back. God, Keith is like a space heater. A really heavy electric blanket. This is good.

"Happy now?" Keith asks after a minute.

"Getting there," Lance says lightly, and opens his eyes to grin down at him. "But I'm still cold, I think we need to heat things up a little."

It takes Keith a moment, but when he gets it he snorts into Lance's sternum.

"Here, now? Right in front of the window?"

"No one ever looks up." Lance slides his hands under Keith's shirt, stroking the warm skin at his sides.

"I have class in like, forty minutes." He's not pushing him away, though.

"I'll suck you off."

Keith considers that. Lance waits.

"Okay."

"Yessss," Lance hisses, and Keith chuckles as he shifts up to nose into Lance's neck. "Your room, though."

"I just washed my sheets."

"Ugh, fine. Carry me?"

"Hm." Keith hums as he presses his lips to Lance's clavicle. "No."

"L-lame. What am I dating you for?"

Keith leans up and grins. "My motorcycle."

"Shit, true."

Keith climbs off him, then, and Lance whines at the loss. He lifts his arms again and Keith obligingly tugs him upwards.

"This was your idea," Keith says with a fond exasperation that Lance is very familiar with.

"Mhm." Now on his feet, Lance stretches a little—god that couch is uncomfortable—and sidles up to his boyfriend. "It sure was." He pushes right up against him for a kiss or two or many, hands exploring the waistband of Keith's jeans—damn, he's wearing the tight ones today. He settles for sliding his hands into his back pockets, for now.

"Lance," Keith says between kisses. "You know I love... kissing you. But can we... get to your... room already, I've got a... time limit."

Lance pulls back a bit. "Babe, that was so unsexy."

Keith smirks. "I could rant about my capstone project and ruin the mood even more."

"Don't you dare."

Keith grins and kisses his nose, just a peck, and then he grabs the front of Lance's shirt and pulls him out of the living room and around the corner to Lance's room.

Just as Lance hoped, Keith is an excellent distraction.

But when he's lying half-naked in bed with no intention of moving, feeling rather pleased with himself, and Keith comes out of the bathroom after washing up and drags his desk chair over to sit in and asks, "So what's wrong?" his mood drops again.

"What do you mean, what's wrong?" he counters, languidly turning his head to look at Keith.

Keith folds his arms on the edge of the mattress—the beds here are absurdly high, like, higher than the desks—and gives him a pointed look. "You only want afternoon sex when you're stressed about something."

Bleh. He didn't know that was obvious.

"Final project shit," he says, because, in fairness, that _was_ his biggest source of stress before today. "Things are ramping up now and our research is almost done, which means I gotta start _writing_ now."

Keith grins and buys it. "Writing's not so bad."

"Says the man who's designing an _app_ for his final project."

"You dug your grave, love."

"Says the man whose major is complete bullshit."

"I'll grant you that." Keith picks up his hand and entwines their fingers. "I gotta get ready for class or I'll miss the bus. You feeling better?"

"Mrgh. You should skip."

"It's only January." Keith squeezes his hand. "If you really want me to, I will, though."

Lance heaves a sigh. "Nah, it's fine," he says. "I'm fine. Go learn your shit."

"Okay." Keith stands up and leans over the bed to kiss him, shortly. "Take a nap, you'll feel better after."

"Babe, that never works."

"You'll be grumpy about being sleepy instead of school shit."

"Fair." Lance tugs him back for another kiss. Keith obliges, but backs toward the door after.

"Don't freeze while I'm gone," he says. Ironic.

"I won't," Lance responds, and fumbles around for his blanket. He closes his eyes but doesn't fall asleep.

* * *

The dossier arrives a scant two days later—long enough for it to really, truly register that Lance is fucked, but not long enough for him to _accept_ it. He goes to his room and stares at it a while without really reading it, brooding. Vacillating between anger and despair.

He opens it up, eventually. They don't have much on this Torch guy: a small, grainy photo, a vague description of his powers (fire-related, obviously), a few lines of incidents attributed to him. Seems like he's a villain after all, by the details they've given. A couple of bank robberies, muggings, small-time stuff. A few people hurt, which usually makes the news—Lance doesn't remember hearing about it, and he usually pays attention to that stuff, but hell, he's in no position to question it. They want him to take this guy down, he'll do it.

Violent resistance is expected, it says at the end. He has permission to kill.

Harsh, Lance thinks bitterly, for a bank robber. But the Association is not known for mercy. They wouldn't have spread so far if they were.

He's not gonna kill this guy, though. Subdue, sure, but it's better to be alive in the hands of the Association than free and dead. Things could always get better.

He doesn't know if they will, but he clings to the possibility.

So that's it then. He's gonna take this guy down and then he's gonna join the Association and he'll be stuck there forever, probably. The note with the dossier says to text confirmation to the number given, so with his heart in his throat, he does.

A reply comes shortly: "Thank you for your cooperation. Upon success, please proceed to the nearest Association building for registration."

Funny how they want him to kill this guy _before_ he's officially in their grasp.

But the Association could be shadier than a cellar at nighttime and he'd still have no choice.

He sticks the dossier in the bottom of a drawer and takes a deep breath. It didn't offer any hints as to how to track him down, which is kind of bullshit because if they know where to find _Lance_ they probably know where to find Torch, but whatever. It just means he's gonna have to go out and hope he stumbles across him, probably. Which means he has to go out _more._

Well, it's not like his classes or grades mean shit anymore.

The city's only so big, anyway. He grabs his stuff and heads out; he doesn't even have a costume, really. Just a mask, and that's easy to hide. He hops on one of the university's shuttle buses into town, because what the hell, might as well take advantage while he still can, right?

All he has to do is find an alley or something to hide in—not hard, Rochester is full of nooks and crannies—and then he can put on his mask and go fight crime or whatever. And hopefully run into Torch.

He doesn't want to, but he has to and that's all that matters.

* * *

It's been a week and Lance has seen no sign of Torch.

 _Heard_ of him, yes—there have been sightings all over the city. More than usual, or maybe it's just the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon striking again. But he hasn't run into him.

He wasn't given a time limit, exactly, but somehow he doesn't think that means there isn't one.

And to top it off... Keith has been distant lately.

In fairness, so has Lance; he didn't really notice until today. But they haven't been talking about classes or their lives or anything much at all. Still eating together, still cuddling at movie night, definitely still sleeping together, but not... talking.

Lance _likes_ talking to Keith. Loves it, in fact. That's the whole thing their relationship is _based_ on—the whole reason they started spending time together at all. Their banter had been antagonistic at first but then it became _fun,_ they talked because it was _fun_ and then they did more than talk and that was fun too but they would never have gotten this far with just _sex._

So when Lance notices, it cuts through his heart like a knife that the best and biggest part of their love has gone without even a whisper of a goodbye. He didn't see it coming. It shouldn't have come at all.

But if he's going to be part of the Association soon... he hates to think it, but maybe it's just as well. Maybe it's better they fade apart now than crash against the inevitable ending when Lance leaves to be a superhero.

It's these thoughts that cause Lance to, when entering his apartment where Keith is quietly reading on the couch, sigh and toss his half-open backpack against the table and slump into the nearest chair instead of taking his stuff to his room. Books and crumpled papers scatter free but he makes no move to pick them up; it doesn't fucking matter anymore, anyway.

Keith, neat freak that he is, sighs too and shoots him a glare. Finding Lance unresponsive, he gets up to passive-aggressively pick up after him.

And then stops, still bent over, a particularly crumpled paper in his hand.

"Lance..." he says in an odd tone, so Lance actually looks.

Most of the text is unreadable without unfolding the paper but what is definitely visible is the Association seal at the top.

" _Shit_." Lance dives out of his seat to grab it out of Keith's hands before he can actually read it, and backs away when Keith tries to snatch it back. "That's, uh, nothing. A prank or something."

Keith straightens up, something hard and cold in his eyes. " _Lance_."

"Seriously Keith, it's nothing, alright?" He starts tearing the letter, just in case. Shredding it as best he can with only his fingers. "Don't worry about it."

"Don't fuck with me, Lance." Keith crosses his arms. "I know that seal. I know _you_ —at least, I thought I did."

 _Well,_ Lance thinks fatalistically, _I guess we're crashing now._

He turns and walks over to the sink, and dumps the fragments of letter into the disposal, because fuck it. He runs the water and flips the switch and waits until the letter is definitely 100% gone before turning it off and turning to face Keith again.

"Can you blame me for wanting to keep that stuff separate?" he asks finally, fighting to keep his voice level. "I'm not exactly registered."

He expects Keith to yell—that's what he always does, he yells and then ten minutes later he's cooled off and it's fine again—but he doesn't yell and it's so much worse.

"I'm your _boyfriend_ ," he says, low and dangerous. "You think I would've turned you in?"

"Of course not! It wasn't..." Lance drags a hand through his hair, trying to find a way to explain the unexplainable. "It wasn't _real._ It was just a sometimes thing, and I was gonna stop after college anyway. It wasn't gonna _affect_ anything."

"Risking your life wasn't gonna affect anything?" Keith asks sharply. "You weren't gonna tell me when it could literally kill you?"

"See, that's a reason _not_ to tell you! There was no reason to worry you—"

"Of course I'd worry! I've been—I watch the _news,_ Lance, and I know you do too. There are dangerous people out there—"

"And how could I tell you I'm one of them!?"

Keith stiffens. "You're a _villain?_ "

"No! No, no no no," Lance corrects quickly, waving his hands. "Of course not! How could you even think—"

" _Well,_ " Keith says, thickly. "Apparently there's a lot I don't know about you."

Lance stops, and takes a deep breath, and lets it out. Keith is still glaring and there's no backing down here, not from either of them. They're driving straight for the cliff but Lance cut the brakes a long time ago.

"There aren't any other secrets," he says finally. "That's the only one. You still know me, Keith."

"There doesn't need to be other secrets," Keith returns. "This one is big enough."

"It wasn't even that big."

"You got a letter from the Association. You just said you're not registered." Keith holds up one finger and then another, brings them together. "Add that together, it sounds pretty big to me."

Lance can't say anything to that. He's right.

"When were you gonna tell me?" Keith asks. "Before you go get registered and they take you away forever? Or were you going to tell me at all?"

Lance sighs and sits heavily at the kitchen table. "I was gonna tell you," he says. "Before... before getting registered."

Keith snorts. "The absolute last minute."

Lance looks up at him. "Can you blame me for wanting to enjoy the time I have left?"

Keith's hands are clenching and unclenching. He looks away.

"I'm going for a walk," he says finally, and marches past Lance to rummage in the closet for his coat. Lance lays his head down on the sticky tabletop and listens to him put the coat on and walk out of the apartment. The door shuts heavily behind him, a cold finality.

Lance chokes on a sob.

This was going to happen eventually, but god, why now?

He knows one thing, though: he desperately wants not to be here when Keith gets back. So he grabs his own coat and his mask and sets out himself.

Torch better pray Lance doesn't find him tonight, because he's not in a mood to be especially merciful.

* * *

Lance has never particularly believed in fate, but some things, much like a letter in a campus mailbox—or in this case, the man that's just dropped down from a fire escape in front of him—can change your worldview in the space between heartbeats.

Because, fate or not, Lance is sure of two things. One, this man is Torch. The costume, the way his fists are burning at his sides—it couldn't be clearer.

Two, he's Keith.

The grainy photo didn't reveal enough, but here, now, in person—even beneath the mask—Lance knows it's him. The way he knows him from behind at great distance, from a faint silhouette in the dark, the way he doesn't even need to see the half of his face still visible. Lance knows the shape of him no matter his costume, like a sixth sense for the man he loves.

Loved?

...Loves.

But he really, really wishes he didn't, because now he has to take him down. Even after their fight—even now that he knows that, wow, Keith's a big fuckin' _hypocrite_ —he's not sure he can do that.

Did the Association know? Is this some sick game they're playing, some extra punishment for trying to fly under their radar?

Or is it just a cruel twist of fate?

"You know why I'm here," says Keith, roughly, when Lance has been silent and still for too long.

Right, okay, he's still mad.

"Yeah," says Lance. "Can't we talk about this, though?"

Keith snorts. "You think the Association would accept that?"

 _Permission to kill,_ they'd said.

"I guess not," Lance says reluctantly. "But do _you_ really want this?"

"Permafrost." Keith shifts, ready, and meets his eyes. "I fucking hate you."

Well.

They really are breaking up, then.

"Alright, man," Lance says, bitterness rising like a tide in his throat as he, too, shifts. "Fuck you, too."

Keith makes the first move, darting forward with fire in his hands. Lance sidesteps, working up an icy layer over his clothes for the protection—for whatever it will help against fire. Mostly he's buying himself time.

He knows how Keith moves, but Keith knows how he moves, too. Physically, he's not sure he matches up.

Lance tosses a couple icicles his way, testing the waters as they circle each other; Keith dodges them easily. They're on pavement here, not ice or snow, so Lance doesn't have the advantage of terrain. If he can lure him out to the street—

Keith darts in again, and this time Lance brings his ice-caked arms up to block the blow. Water spatters against their shoes and Lance can feel the heat through his coat before he falls back. He starts backing up down the alley, as much to get towards the street as to put some distance between them.

But Keith gives chase. Of course he does. He strikes again and Lance barely dodges out of the way.

"Coward," Keith hisses, and it slices straight through Lance's heart.

"Shut the fuck _up_ ," he growls back, and lifts the icicles in his hands. Keith ducks away from his blow, sweeping a leg towards Lance's. Lance hops back neatly and flings the icicles.

Keith cringes back, blocking rather than dodging, and one icicle manages to cut through his coat—not that Lance can see what damage he's done. From the knot in his stomach, maybe it's better that way.

Fuck, he's pissed, but he still doesn't want Keith dead.

He turns and sprints towards the street.

"HEY!" Keith shouts, but Lance doesn't look back.

He bursts out onto the street, and the few nearby pedestrians—bless them—take one look at him and jog leisurely out of the way. Way too used to this shit, he supposes. He only hesitates half a second, picking a direction, but apparently that's all Keith needs, because something hard and heavy collides with him from behind and he tumbles to the ground.

Lance yells as burning hands dig into his shoulders, and the weight on his back that before was so reassuring now fills him with anger. He stabs back blindly with an icicle, forcing Keith to slide off, and rolls away.

Keith scrambles after him, tackling him again before either of them have fully gotten up. He doesn't quite pin him again before Lance is kicking him off and half-crawling towards the verge. His hands hit snow—dirty, plowed off the street, but definitely snow.

_Yes._

This time when Keith leaps after him he collides headfirst with a wall of ice that wasn't there a second ago. Lance extends the wall around himself, reinforcing it where it starts melting under Keith's hands. He takes the moment to breathe, trying to ignore the pain in his shoulders.

What the _fuck_ is he going to do?

He has to subdue Keith, that much is clear, but Keith isn't the sort to give up. Unless he's just planning to subdue Lance, too, but...

Well, Lance isn't sure he can count on that. Not anymore.

He'll just have to play it by ear.

He's running out of snow to use, but he makes sure he's perched firmly on the last of it before dropping the wall entirely. Keith lurches, off balance, and Lance gives him a good shove before aiming icicles to pin him down.

Keith, of course, rolls out of the way and back onto his feet, and now they're back in a standoff.

"Give up," says Keith. "Make it easy on yourself."

Lance freezes. Was he wrong? _Would_ Keith take him in alive, after all?

But Keith lunges in again, taking advantage of his moment of paralysis and sending Lance scrambling back along the verge. Keith sends a flaming fist his way with his hate in his eyes, and, well.

Lance knows that look.

That's not a look that accepts surrender.

It's all he can do to fend Keith off, again. The few attacks he manages to try are easily blocked or dodged. The pain in his shoulders dulls only because the burns on his arms and stomach are equally distracting. He tries icing them at first but it's not worth the energy.

And then he backs into a pole.

Keith smirks, and Lance knows he's lost.

In a last, desperate move, he drops to the snowy ground, kicking out his legs. They connect with Keith's knees and he topples.

Lance is frozen for a second, breathing hard, shocked. And then he lunges for Keith's hands, pinning them down under as much ice as he can summon even though his vision wavers.

Keith _screams,_ and it tears through Lance's soul.

"Surrender," he gasps, and it's almost a sob.

Keith looks up. He's lost his mask; there are tracks through the dirt on his face but Lance can't tell if they're sweat or tears.

"Never," he whispers.

He curls up, tucking his feet under him, and heaves upwards even as Lance presses down. The ice cracks and Lance wills it to hold.

This is all he has. This is _it._

"Please," he says.

Keith meets his eyes, and breaks free.

Lance catches a glimpse of his hands, angry red against the snow—the two smaller fingers of his right hand are turning white, god, did he give him  _frostbite_ —and then Keith lunges.

If the burns before were bad, this is ten times worse. Keith's hands close around his left arm and set his coat ablaze and the pain fills Lance's head and overflows. He thinks he screams, but he can't hear, see—only feel the fire creeping up and down his arm.

He writhes in the slush, kicking blindly, and it's only because he's suddenly able to roll over that he knows he's gotten free. He buries his left side against the frozen ground—it's not cold enough, not nearly, and forces himself to look.

Keith is standing a few feet away, completely still, a red and black blur. Looking at his handiwork, Lance guesses.

He flings a few icicles Keith's way with his good arm to buy himself more time, scoots a little further away, blinking to try and restore his vision against the screaming pain in his arm.

Keith doubles over, clearer now, and looks at Lance. Lance looks back, confused. Did... did the icicles _hit?_ Did Keith just stand there and take them? Did he not notice?

Shit, he... there's one in his hip. One in his _chest._

Lance sits up, clutching his arm, and then he sees his mask in the snow a couple feet away.

"Lance," Keith whispers, and collapses. Wait. Wait, he...

Oh.

Oh god.

Oh _god._

Oh god. Oh fuck. Oh no, no, no no no...

Lance drags himself to Keith's side. Sees the blood leaking from the corner of his mouth. Hears his breath, bubbling and wheezing.

"Keith," Lance says. Reaches for him, but his left arm can't support his weight. Falls face-first into the slush at his side.

Keith coughs. He turns his head, meets Lance's eyes. His face is stricken, guilt written in every tear-track in the dirt.

One shaking hand, red and white, lifts.

"Keith," Lance whispers. "Keith. How come you didn't know?"

The hand falls. Lance grasps it, holds it tightly. It's too cold and it's all his fault.

"Keith," he sobs. "Why didn't you know it was me?"

There's no answer. Keith's still looking at him, unfocused.

Lance squeezes his hand, but Keith's gaze doesn't waver, and something hard and cold sinks into his gut. He can hear footsteps nearby, cars, murmurs, his own ragged breathing. He can't hear Keith's.

"No," he whispers. "No. Keith. No." He scoots closer, letting go of Keith's hand to cup his cheek. "No, no, no. Keith. C'mon, wake up."

Keith doesn't move or react. Lance's vision blurs, and sobs wrack his body.

"No, Keith," he repeats. "No. Wake up."

* * *

Lance doesn't notice the Association van pull up, but he notices when hands try to pull him up out of the slush, away from Keith. He screams and struggles but there's fuck all he can do in this state, and they drag him in, wrap him in blankets, hand him a mug of something warm.

He flings it against the door, and they don't give him another one, just wrap the blankets tighter.

There's paper waved in his face at some point, pens and voices and signatures. Dimly he realizes he must be registered, now, but can't really muster the energy to be upset over it.

His life is already over.

He's ushered into a white room, eventually, and a woman with dark skin and silver hair tends to his burns. She's a super, he can tell that much, but he barely so much as looks at her. He doesn't _care._

"You've had a rough day, I see," she says conversationally.

Of course, he thinks, a little hysterically. She doesn't even know. Why would she?

But the last thing he wants to do is tell anyone what he's done.

So he sits up a little straighter, makes an effort to meet her eyes. Bluer than his. Brighter than Keith's, but not nearly as beautiful.

He's going to pretend. And then he's going to keep pretending, for as long as it takes.

"I guess you could say that," he whispers.

**Author's Note:**

> >:3c
> 
> [here's a playlist](https://open.spotify.com/user/1252820882/playlist/26We1RrByShNf4P1IlrIs7)
> 
> im writing more of this au for the supernova bang (assuming i dont drop out lol) and i signed up for klance so, make of that what you will.
> 
> find me @ [maternalcube](http://maternalcube.tumblr.com/) on tumbl


End file.
